Jerome Rothenberg: from 'A Seneca Journal': 'Midwinter'

[No longer readily available, this section of A Seneca Journal was an early attempt of mine toward a poetry of minimal means — observations & off-the-cuff translations during my first viewing of the Seneca Indian Midwinter ceremonies at the Allegany Seneca reservation in western New York State.  While I’ve intercalated much of A Seneca Journal in later gatherings of my poetry I was never able to provide an alternative place for these poems, though I still find them crucial to the work that was then unfolding for myself & others. At this later point in my life they present me with a kind of personal dreamtime, a little mysterious in retrospect & in no sense the true Seneca story as such, but vital to me in figuring what it means, both then & now, to be living in a state-of-poetry.]

 

A man who was a crow was traveling. He didn’t know where he had come from or which way he was going. As he moved along he kept on thinking: “How did I come to be alive? Where did I come from? Where am I going?”

 

THE HEADS

(1)

big

 

(2)

bushy

 

(3)

flying

STIRRING THE ASHES
 

sun bear

moon buffalo 

 

4 SONGS OF THE DAWN SOCIETY

(1)

dawn

 

(2)

dawn

 

(3)

dawn

 

(4)

dawn

 

THE BEAR ROBE

had no claws

 

THE BUFFALO ROBE

was headless

 

MIDWINTER VISION 

paddles & ashes

 

EVENTS

 

fire a rifle

 

•

 

touch the sun
 

THE BIG HEADS

 

husk

shoes

 

husk

belt

 

husk

crown

 

bear

snout

 

THE BIGHEADS SEND A MESSAGE:

 

HELLO        STAY CLEAN       DONT BE CONFUSED     DON’T STEP ON
THINGS WHEN MOVING   (signed)   YOUR UNCLES

 

THE BEAR

his paw up                                                                                                                                                  
to the sun

 

THE BUFFALO

head crowned                                                                                                                                          
with flowers

 

BUFFALO PUDDING

like the mud                                                                                                                                                 
he stamps in

 

BEARDANCE

snort                                                                                                                                                                   
snort                                                                                                                                                        
berries

 

BUFFALO DANCE

sniff                                                                                                             sniff                                                                                                                                                           
mush

 

THE SYMBOL

pine branch

on men’s room wall above

the thermostat

 

•

 

pine branch on mask

 

 

THE FACES (1)

blew ashes      

thru my hair

 

THE FACES (2)

whose big mask

cools it down

 

THE FACES (3)

with hanging little balls

of medicine

 

THE FACES (4) 

had gambled for                                                                                                                                                         
the earth

 

FALSE FACES

& phony smiles

 

THE INSTRUMENTS (1)

pounders for corn

paddles for soup

 

THE INSTRUMENTS (2) 

water                                                                                                                              
drums

 

horn

rattles

 

FIRE EVENTS

put out an old fire

 

•

 

kindle a new fire

 

•

          

do a war dance in the name of peace

 

(interlude)

 

speaking to Ham

was flicking my ashes into Leslie Bowen’s

soup pail 

 

SIGNATURES (1)

their names on a paddle

 

SIGNATURES (2)

Emory Jacobs

Double Flower

 

SIGNATURES (3)

18–

96

 

SYMMETRICAL POEM

shaking the pumpkin

 

•

 

shaking the bush

 

•

 

shaking the jug

 

POUNDING THE WOODEN FLOOR WITH BROOMSTICKS
THE WOMEN
SANG SIX SONGS

going walking
in the middle of the room
a garden
I was  alone
we all came back
& sat here

 

MIDWINTER MEMORY

Green Corn 

 

SONG

****************************

*I*love*my************world*

****************************

****************************

*I*love*my*************time*

****************************

****************************

*I*love*my*growing*children*

****************************

****************************

*I*love*my*******old*people*

****************************

****************************

*I*love*my*******ceremonies*

****************************

 

PRAYER EVENT

dancing

 

OBSOLETE QUESTIONS

 

who’s got an old dream?

 

•

 

who’s got a new dream?

 

•

 

who’s got a white dog?

 

 

DREAM EVENT (1)

 

See something in a dream & tell it as a riddle.

 

Let someone guess the riddle, let him give the object as a gift.

 

 

DREAM EVENT (2)

 

Act out a dream.

 

Let everybody’s brains turn upside down.

 

 

THE PUMPKIN

has a lake inside it

 

THE BEADS

seen in my eyes –

with many colors

* dream-guessing riddles

 

MIDWINTER

when I cough

 

THE ANCESTORS

Handsome

Lake

 

•

 

Happy                                                                                                                                       
Hoolihan

  

CONCLUSION

 

it was all I could do

 

•

 

it was all I had learned

 

•

 

it was all that there was

 

 

[N.B. A special boxed edition of Seneca Journal: Midwinter, “with objects & collages by the author & Philip Sultz,” was published by Singing Bone Press, St. Louis, in 1975.  The cover of that edition appears above.]